On September 27, 1976, the Grateful Dead brought their return-to-the-road tour to the Community War Memorial in Rochester, deep into a second-set run — Help on the Way > Slipknot! > The Other One > Wharf Rat > Slipknot! > Franklin’s Tower — that deadheads still trade tapes over. The band had spent much of 1974 and 1975 off the road after retiring the massive Wall of Sound, and this fall run marked them finding their footing again as a touring unit. Fifty years later, the Rochester tape remains one of the most beloved recordings from that comeback stretch.
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